The 109th Executive
Board meeting of the Air
Line Pilots Association,
Int’l, concluded
yesterday with
the Association’s 37
master executive council
(MEC) chairmen endorsing
a comprehensive
restructuring of the
Association’s financial
resources and services.

The Executive Board
acted on six
recommendations from
ALPA’s Executive Council
based on a comprehensive
report by ALPA’s Special
Committee for Finance,
Structure, and Services
(SCFFS), which was
created in 2010 to
examine how the
organization could
better utilize its
resources to provide the
most effective services
for members. This
direction came directly
from ALPA’s Board of
Directors strategic
plan.

The Executive Board
unanimously approved the
Executive Council’s
recommendations to
simplify ALPA’s
financial policies and
provide greater
efficiencies in the use
of members’ dues
dollars, including:

• simplifying the
allocation of dues by
reducing the allocation
to four accounts while
preserving funding
levels: MECs, Local
Executive Councils (LECs),
the Operating
Contingency Fund (OCF),
and the Administrative &
Support Account (A&S or
National Account);

• improving MEC and LEC
expense controls and
creating a Resource and
Planning Team to
increase coordination
with MECs on planning,
resource, and funding
issues prior to and
during contract
negotiations;

More than 120 people—ALPA
safety and security
representatives, line
pilots, law enforcement
officers, military
officers, and
representatives of
several U.S., Canadian,
and European government
agencies and airline
managements—gathered
today in Washington,
D.C., to share
information about the
growing problem of laser
illumination of aircraft
cockpits. ALPA and the
Air Transport
Association cosponsored
the conference, titled,
“Laser Illumination of
Aircraft: A Growing
Threat.”

Rep. Dan Lungren
(R-CA) discussed his
bill (H.R. 386), passed
earlier this year by the
U.S. House of
Representatives, that
would make aiming a
laser pointer at an
aircraft a federal
crime. Asked about other
aspects of U.S. aviation
security, Lungren
declared, “We are safer
now than before 9/11,
but we need to do a
better job of telling
the public that.”

ALPA’s president,
Capt. Lee Moak, praised
Lungren’s efforts on
behalf of aviation
safety and security and
reiterated ALPA’s
vigorous support for the
Lungren bill. Moak
noted, “One of my
earliest initiatives as
ALPA’s president was to
develop an action plan
in January to deal with
[laser illuminations].”

• According to the Los Angeles Times, the Homeland Security Department
is adding three surveillance drone aircraft to a domestic fleet chiefly used to
patrol the border with Mexico, even though officials acknowledge they don't have
enough pilots to operate the seven Predators they already possess.
Read more.

From Oct. 29 to Nov. 4, 1934, ALPA held its second Board of Directors meeting.
This governing body used these days to adopt the Association’s first complete
bylaws, to develop ALPA’s first budget plan, and to approve the ALPA emblem. The
BOD also called for a seniority system at all member carriers, elected David
Behncke to a second term as ALPA president, and made the position of the
presidency a full-time job.

If you have moved or changed your ISP or e-mail
address, please update your ALPA records. If you don’t, you
will no longer receive the ALPA FastRead and other e-mail bulletins and notices,
and once your postal forwarding order expires, you’ll no longer receive the
magazine and other ALPA mail. You can do it yourself by going to
www.alpa.org and logging
in. Go to “My ALPA” in the menu at the top of the page, and from there, you’ll be
instructed how to make the necessary changes.

If you don’t have access to the
members-only section of
www.alpa.org, you can
e-mail your requests by sending them to
membership@alpa.org. Be sure to include your member number or enough other
information so that we can identify you in the membership database, and tell us
what information needs to be updated.

Please note that it is not sufficient
just to notify your LEC or MEC of these changes—you should register them with
the ALPA Membership Department in Herndon.

Can’t remember your member number
or how to log in? Need information about your ALPA insurance programs? These and
other questions about ALPA services can be answered by contacting
membership@alpa.org.